With ‘Virginia Way,’ State Thought It Didn’t Need Rules

WASHINGTON — The gift-giving scandal that federal prosecutors described in evocative detail in their indictment on corruption charges Tuesday of former Gov. Bob McDonnell of Virginia and his wife, Maureen, would be ample evidence of a possible crime in some states.

But no Virginia laws bar elected officials from taking $165,000 worth of Oscar de la Renta dresses, a Rolex watch, Louis Vuitton shoes, Cape Cod weekends, golf greens fees and cash that prosecutors have accused the McDonnells of accepting from Jonnie R. Williams Sr., the head of a struggling dietary supplement company that sought aid from the state. Nor are there restrictions on what gifts family members of Virginia officeholders can accept or any limits whatsoever on the source or size of campaign contributions to politicians.

This anything-goes culture is rooted at least in part in Virginia’s idea of itself, or what is sometimes referred to there as “the Virginia Way.” The Old Dominion — a commonwealth, as people here are quick to point out, not a state — has for centuries fancied itself a haven of good government led by public-spirited citizens dating to Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson.

Strict ethics laws simply were not needed, the thinking went, because bribery — at least not in the most overt sense — did not happen within the chiseled walls of what is still called “Mr. Jefferson’s Capitol” in Richmond.

This founding myth has been punctured in recent years amid lower-grade scandals, and many Virginians believe the notion has been shattered by a 43-page legal document that reads like the raw materials for the next great political novel.

“We are broke, have an unconscionable amount in credit card debt already, and this Inaugural is killing us!” Ms. McDonnell emailed one of her husband’s staff members, by way of pleading to let Mr. Williams buy her a $10,999 Oscar de la Renta dress to wear at the ceremony in 2010. “I need answers and I need help, and I need to get this done.”

Such blunt language from the indictment has been the talk of both Richmond and Washington this week, stunning longtime observers of and participants in the state’s politics.

“It is a culture shock to Virginia,” said John Chichester, a white-haired former Virginia state senator. “The mere fact that there is an indictment is a culture shock to the people of Virginia. That happens in other states. We don’t ever have that.”

The scandal has given fresh urgency for legislators and Virginia’s newly inaugurated governor, Terry McAuliffe, to enact limits on gifts to elected officials and their families. On his first day in office this month, Mr. McAuliffe signed an executive order imposing a $100 cap on gifts to himself and members of the executive branch. Lawmakers are considering legislation to apply similar measures to other state elected officials in Virginia.

“The legislature will address our ethics laws, and they will probably be tightened up this year in terms of gift disclosure,” said H. Benson Dendy III, a longtime Richmond lobbyist who worked for two Democratic governors. Mr. Dendy said Virginia lawmakers would probably put a price cap on the gifts they can take and, given Ms. McDonnell’s role in the Williams case, seek to broaden the law to require that family members of politicians disclose what they receive.

For the lobbyists who roam the General Assembly building and white-columned Capitol, which Mr. Jefferson did in fact design, the McDonnell scandal threatens what was effectively an unspoken gentleman’s agreement in which they could offer campaign contributions, meals and sports tickets in exchange for, at least, access.

The system began at a time when most of the state’s leadership consisted of elites — almost entirely white men — who were unrepresentative of the population at large but who also were unlikely to pressure businessmen to help pay their mortgages.

“Years ago, when I first became involved in politics, the state was generally run by wealthy individuals who practiced noblesse oblige, and they wouldn’t need anything like this or consider asking for it,” said Mr. Dendy, who began working in Richmond in the 1970s.

There was a sense of decorum to the system that “was sort of in the DNA of the culture of the commonwealth,” said Charlie Davis, who represents alcohol, gambling and tobacco interests.

Mr. Davis, who speaks with a slow, gravelly Southern drawl, said Virginia legislators had not imposed more draconian anticorruption laws “because everybody was expected to obey not only the letter but the spirit of the process.”

“Maybe that shield, whatever it is that has protected Virginia, maybe it’s just the evolution of the political process that’s finally manifesting itself here,” Mr. Davis added.

Rick Boucher, a former Virginia state senator and congressman who was in office for 35 years, boasted that the state had been “remarkably free of scandal, remarkably free of corruption” and therefore laws were not needed for “people elected to office who continued in that proud tradition.”

“But it’s clear times have changed,” he said.

A version of this article appears in print on , Section A, Page 3 of the New York edition with the headline: With ‘Virginia Way,’ State Thought It Didn’t Need Rules. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe